


Familiar Sight

by Mun V (Vendetta_Panda)



Series: Two Sides of the Same Coin: Lucas and the Breather [1]
Category: Welcome to the Game (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Best Friends, Friendship, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt, Trauma
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-09
Updated: 2019-11-09
Packaged: 2021-01-26 06:36:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,830
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21369769
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vendetta_Panda/pseuds/Mun%20V
Summary: Michael and Lucas are best friends. They haven't always gotten along but they understand what the other has been through better than anybody and they know that sticking together is the best treatment for pain with no cure. Unfortunately, the experiences of the past that they have come to have in common seldom stay buried. When the heartache resurfaces, it takes a friend to pull one or the other back from the edge. Michael only hopes he's not too late to save his friend from falling into a ditch he may never get out of.
Series: Two Sides of the Same Coin: Lucas and the Breather [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1540582
Kudos: 5





	Familiar Sight

Driving along through a quieter part of Buffalo, Michael couldn’t help but smile as Lucas’ temporary base of operations came into view. It was a modest size home with a fairly large backyard, white picket fencing guarding the perimeter and garnished by vines of catmint that reached purple-petaled fingers through bars of wood and curled upward around the freshly painted surface. Early summer weather yielded bounties of bleeding hearts that bloomed around the edges of the large front deck of the house, creeping slowly up the porch and painting the well-swept wood with purple and white. Hardy geraniums lined the stone walkway up to the front door, complemented by coral bells that grew in the gaps of the deck steps up to the elevated porch. In the yard, clusters of clover and dandelions were beginning to take root, white puffed heads nudged by the cool breeze that blew by. Michael pulled up his mask, giving a bittersweet smile to the plants in the yard. How he wished he could smell them— he would have betted that Lucas was right when he said the air smelled so clean and fresh here. If only he didn’t have a pollen allergy. 

As he climbed up the steps, he took the time to wipe his boots off on the welcome mat at the front door. He paused, tensing up for a moment. Something didn’t feel right. Something felt off. Incredibly off. But he could quite place what. His hand rose to knock on the door, but his fingers hesitated to curl, leaving his wrist held up by some invisible balloon. Dangling. He blinked, hairless brows moving towards each other, creating a fissure in his brow line as deep as the growing concern that was slowly sinking downwards and forming a pit in his stomach. He tried to shake it off, but some hot-blooded feeling of dread washed over Michael as he wrapped his knuckles against the door. He called out, announcing himself to the resident hitman inside the building. No response. 

That was pretty standard. For as long as he had known Lucas, he had never been the openly communicative type. Not verbally at least. Often he got more conversation out of texts and emails than words. But even knowing this, the silence Michael received did nothing for that looming sense that something was very, very wrong. He knocked again, calling out his friend’s name. Again, he got no response. He waited a moment, before trying the handle. Locked. Though he didn’t quite know what he was expecting of a man who’s business centered around the art of infiltration and security. Something in his right mind told him that he shouldn’t have done it, but from prior experience, Michael knew that was his gut’s way of telling him to act immediately; he pressed an ear against the door and his brows furrowed, eyes finding some blank placeholder on the ceiling above him to focus on as he concentrated on listening. Silence, more silence, and a whine. A dog’s whimper. He could hear an animal whimpering. 

Something was terribly wrong and Michael knew it. 

As quickly and as subtly as he could manage with a rising panic in his chest, he glanced around for any nosy neighbors standing out on their decks to witness the man emerging from his large white van and looking to inquire what his business in their neighborhood was. No nosy neighbors, no stray dog walkers, no one lurking about in the broad daylight of the lovely summer afternoon. He ran to the edge of the deck and jumped from the short ledge. His landing sent up a wave of dandelion seeds that scattered and danced in the wind around him as he took off, running through the yard and around the side of the house to where there was a fence gate. His mind didn’t focus on slowing down to properly undo the latch— rather, in a burst of adrenaline-fueled frenzy, he rushed towards the barrier and grabbed the rounded top of the short door, vaulting over it without hesitation. The metal latch clicked against itself briefly as if to protest the move but it was blocked out by the sound of wind rushing in Michael’s ears. He raced through the garden in the back, mind having only an ounce of sense within it to avoid trampling any of the fruits, vegetables, or herbs Lucas trying to raise and instead make a beeline to the back door using the neatly-kept path to the back porch. Long legs closed the distance between one end of the garden and the back door in seconds, and after a short hop, he found himself at Lucas’ back door fervently twisting and pulling on the handle to let himself in. The door shook violently on its hinges but did not give: locked.

Furiously, the Breather warped the wire mesh of the screen door, fists stretching the material to make contact with the glass door just past it. He yelled for Lucas to let him in. He pleaded for Lucas to answer him, harping until his lungs burned and he was forced to relent, slumping over with his hands on his knees as he strained to catch what little breath he could. There was shifting from within the house that temporarily made him hold in the air he so desperately craved. A moment passed, and suddenly a head popped out of the doggie door at the bottom of the barrier he’d been so desperate to get past just seconds ago. A large muzzle sniffed at the air before the rest of the Great Dane’s head followed suit. The dog and Michael made eye contact, both seeming to share some common feeling of desperation and anxiety, as the of quickly began whining at the sight of him and scratching at the door, attempting to get its foot through the door clearly too small for its noggin, much less the rest of it. After a moment it pulled back. Michael hesitated, before sinking to his knees and reaching forward. A dithery hand cautiously made its way towards the doggy door flaps. It was made for a large dog. Not quite Great Dane size, but a large breed all the same. Upon raising it to peek inside, Michael saw the same dog staring at him. He could see a service dog vest on it as it stood there, looking away at something, before slowly blinking and looking at him. It barked once, then again. It ran out of sight behind a wall and then peered back around the corner, looking at him. It was trying to tell him something. It was trying to get him to follow. 

“How.” He muttered to himself. With these two doors together, he couldn’t possibly kick it in. Suddenly, he looked at the edges of the doggy door, then at himself. Would it be possible for him to squeeze through? There was only one way to find out. The man stuck his head in through the flap, grunting as he hunched his shoulders together in an attempt to get them through. Hands made it through the gap easily enough. Now it was just a matter of getting the rest of himself through. The edges of the hole dug into his ribs, then his sides, squeezing and causing him to whimper and just pause to catch his breath. The sound of claws tapping against the ground did not register, but just as he was about to give up, Mike felt his hood rise off of his head and something strong pulling at his jacket. The dog had a hold on his clothing and was attempting to pull him inside. He inhaled, trying to suck in his gut with the air and dug sweaty palms into the floorboards, working with the mutt to get himself inside. With one final tug, he pulled his legs through the gap and tried to sit for a moment so he could catch his breath. The service dog was having none of it though and nearly dragged him around the corner. Try as he might to tell the pet off, he could not find his feet as he was pulled along. When it finally did let go, he noticed the three other dogs. An expression of puzzlement turned to shock and horror as he saw what they were crowded around and whimpering at. 

Lucas was laying face down on his kitchen floor. 

Michael scrambled towards him, gently nudging the dogs aside and slowly rolling him over onto his back. He was unconscious and unresponsive. He looked a mess, clean white shirt disheveled and wrinkled, dress pants hanging askew off of his hip. Thick streams of drool ran down his chin and cheeks. He reeked of vomit. Upon examination, he couldn’t hear him breathing. His eyes were bloodshot and completely unresponsive to light. Michael could feel his own eyes beginning to well up with tears as he progressively began mumbling louder and louder to himself with each examination, praying and begging to God to have mercy on Lucas. His chest quivered, breaths barely controlled as the urge to sob formed lead bubbles in his chest. It was contained only by a sharp gasp when he brought his fingers up to Lucas’ neck. There he felt it. Soft, faint, but rapidly beating was his pulse. 

There was still a chance. 

Without missing a beat, Michael dialed the hospital and declared an emergency. He called for an ambulance and tried his best to give a report of what had happened and what he was doing while holding back tears. Of sorrow or joy, he could not tell. All he could focus on was keeping Lucas alive until the ambulance arrived. The dogs circling him only exacerbated the sense of anxiety he felt as he performed CPR on his friend, begging him between compressions and breaths to stay with Michael, to not go yet. He tried to ask him what was wrong, he tried to ask why he was doing this, he begged and pleaded and sobbed for him not to leave him alone. He tried to get a response out of him for twenty minutes before the flashing red and white lights of the ambulance appeared outside. Help was there, but Michael just couldn’t bring himself to stop. Perhaps it was a feeling of dedication to a patient, perhaps it was because Lucas was his friend. Or perhaps it because he refused to feel insecure and helpless and be just a bystander in someone else’s suffering again. 

Whatever the reason, they had to pry him off of Lucas and forcefully pull him out of the ambulance to get him to stop so they could take over, and Michael screamed the whole time. The tears finally broke the dams of professionalism and control behind his eyes, forming rivers on his pale cheeks as a group of strangers carried away someone he cared about once again.


End file.
